


Resistance

by Bearfootscar



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Dialogue, Complete, F/M, Reconciliation, Self-Harm, Slow Burn, Wordcount: 10.000-30.000, bad dancing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-28
Updated: 2015-08-04
Packaged: 2018-03-26 03:11:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3834832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bearfootscar/pseuds/Bearfootscar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the Reapers invade Earth, Shepard cannot bring herself to leave it in shambles.  Insisting that she no longer works for the Alliance, she resists Anderson's orders and remains in Vancouver.  She didn't expect Anderson to assign Major Alenko and Lieutenant Vega to accompany her while he heads to the Citadel to negotiate with the Council.  Overcoming reapers is one thing, but working with Kaidan again?  That's going to get complicated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This all began with the musing, what if Shepard and Anderson switched roles during the Reaper Invasion of Earth? What if she stayed and started a resistance movement and he went to the Council? 
> 
> This is my first multi-chapter fic that I'm posting as I write it, and I'll do my best to update consistently, but please forgive my slow writing. I hope you enjoy the story, and feel free to leave comments :3

She thought the swarm of husks barring their escape had all been summarily incinerated by her shotgun blasts, but when she turned to break for it, she nearly collided into one of the horrific creatures.  She didn’t even have time to gasp before it clasped around her and started pummelling her face and arms.

Shepard was a highly trained and proficient soldier, but the visceral terror of grappling with a once-human monster made her hesitate a crucial second.  Instinctively, her hands came up to protect her face from the husk’s deadly claws, but in the half-second it took to wrangle her paralyzing fear, the beast swiped backward and dragged its claws along her forearm.  She recognized the flesh rip and rend more like someone watching a clinical training vid rather than one whose arm had just been rended to the bone.  But she was a soldier, so she just filed away the creature’s tactic for future analysis and added a semi-conscious thought that she would need medi-gel later.

She turned her attention once again to freeing herself from the monster’s grip, but before her biotic nova had a chance to charge, a crack near her ear sent the creature flying up and away from her.  Normally, she would raise her Eviscerator to blast its head off its shoulders, but her arm would not comply.

 _May need more than Medi-gel on this one_ , she thought as she reached for her pistol with her offhand.  Luckily, another shot from behind her lodged into the husk's shoulder.  It staggered and fell backwards, and while she would have delighted in seeing its brains splatter, she was satisfied that it didn’t get back up.  She cast a quick glance behind her to thank James for the assistance, but instead met Major Alenko’s hard eyes.  She nodded in appreciation, and he tersely nodded back before turning away to survey the scene.

This location was where Anderson said they would pick up the Normandy, so she scoured the skies for the ship.  It was hard to believe that only an hour ago, these people were going about their normal lives, blissfully unaware that a war was upon them.  Now she hears bullets, rending metal, and Reaper screeches echoing off the water of the harbor.  Even she, who had been mentally preparing herself for three years for this inevitability, was not ready for how demoralizing total war on Earth felt.  Perhaps ignorance would have been preferable to this sinking feeling that three years of escalating nightmares have finally become reality.

Fighting not to let her morale flag, she willed Joker to fly her ship faster, to get them the hell out of this place, to bring them…  Well somewhere where something could be done to mitigate the madness she saw unfolding before her.  She felt James move up behind her and knew that he was gaping at her injured arm.  She knew not to look at the wound.  Not yet.  Not until the mission was complete.  With injuries, ignorance really is bliss.  She’s seen too many good soldiers fall to pieces when they recognized their own blood and bones, but the low whistle between James' teeth told her that it was just as bad as she had earlier surmised.

Before he could say anything, their radios crackled to life with Anderson’s voice. “... position locked ...” she was able to make out through the static.  It was enough to know that the Normandy would be visible at any moment.

A Reaper scream and Kaidan’s assault rifle split the air almost simultaneously alerting her that they may have to fight off another wave if they didn’t hustle.  Thankfully, a glint on the horizon signaled that their ride had arrived.  She motioned wordlessly to Kaidan who started to fall back to join them on the end of the remains of the dock they were holding.  A horde of Reaper forces was moving in and among the ruined storage containers at the other end of the dock, but she could hear the Normandy’s propulsion behind her.  Her soldier brain calculated that they would have plenty of time for extraction so long as someone laid down some cover fire.  She side glanced at Kaidan who was already crackling with blue biotic energy.  Even with a bum arm, their practiced tactic of repelling oncoming forces with simultaneous biotic surges synced up perfectly, sending several husks splashing into the water of English Bay.  In her periphery, she caught a familiar twitch on the corner of Kaidan’s lips that made her chest tighten.  He had made his displeasure with her company clear, but she hoped that he could at least agree that if felt good to fight alongside each other again.

Gushing winds swirling around them reminded her that this was not a time for nostalgia, but an extraction mission.  The Normandy loomed large behind them as the cargo bay door lowered.  Anderson emerged with an assault rifle and started expertly popping off Reaper troops as though the weapon had never left his hand in his three years serving on the Council.  She, James, and Kaidan all turned heel and leapt the narrow gap between the dock and the platform.  As their feet touched down, the ship began its ascent and EDI familiarly chimed, “Welcome aboard, Shepard.”

***

 

“The Citadel?” she asked, shaking her head incredulously.  

“The Council is our only hope, Shepard.  You know we can’t defend Earth alone.”  Anderson met her glare and held it authoritatively.  The Alliance doctor that was wrapping her forearm meekly shuffled out of the medbay as the air turned palpable.

“The Council,” she spat, “has never listened to reason before.  Why would they start now?”  She waved her good arm to dismiss the notion.

“Damn it, Shepard, this is no time for holding a grudge.  We need an army.”  When she didn’t immediately retaliate, he lowered his voice and added, “We need an alliance.”  

She harumphed and crossed her arms, pointedly ignoring the freshly sutured wound.  Behind Anderson, James and Kaidan pretended not to listen to their argument, but she still felt their attention upon her.  It felt like everyone in the room was holding their breath.

“I’m not leaving Earth like this.  We need to fight here.”  She tightened her grip on her elbows but refused to let herself wince.  Now was not the time to show even an ounce of hesitation.  

Anderson's voice deepened, “Shepard, you are going to the Citadel.  That’s an order.”  

“I don’t work for you anymore.”  

The words came out before she had time to consider them.  If there was anyone in Alliance brass that she still respected, it was Anderson.  She was still bitter about her “relief from duty” after her assault on the Collector Base, and although she knew she sounded like a defiant teenager, the words hung pregnant in the space between them.  Now spoken, there was no going back.

Anderson sighed and dropped his hands loosely to his sides.  

“All right, Shepard.  You win.  I’ll go to the Citadel myself and try to convince the Council.  But, I’m assigning Vega and Alenko to accompany you.  You don’t work for the Alliance anymore, so you’re going to need their support to make any kind of difference down there.”  She tried to hide her surprise.  She had not expected him to capitulate so quickly, and definitely didn’t predict that he would assign Kaidan and James to accompany her.  He sounded weary though, and although she got her way, his voice stabbed her with guilt.

“EDI, identify a location in Vancouver where we can drop off without getting too much attention,” Shepard asked shrugging off the guilt as command took precedence.  She could feel guilty later when there was not so much work to be done.  

“Right away, Shepard,” EDI responded.  

The order left a bitter taste in her mouth, so before turning to leave the medbay she met Anderson’s gaze again.

“Tell you what, Admiral,” she paused dramatically and grinned at the old soldier.  “You get the Council to reinstate me as a Spectre and I’ll let you give me one order.  As long as it’s a good one.”   She let the medbay door swish behind her before she could see his reaction, but at least Anderson knew she was on his side.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In just two weeks, Shepard has gotten a small resistance movement started, but things are growing more tense with Kaidan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Damn this got longer than I anticipated. *shrugs* Enjoy!

They lied in ambush near the corner deli. She chose this alleyway for its ample cover and in the hopes that even the Reaper forces would be dissuaded from the overpowering odor of long neglected waste bins.  

“Lola, you don’t know.  Maybe husks like rancid sun-baked turkey?” James had commented when she suggested the theory.

“Looks like we’ll just have to find out then, eh?” she had said with a smile and a jab to his arm.  They had only been working together for a few weeks now, and the nickname thing had irked her at first, but she’d grown to really enjoy his company.  And his aim.  He had gladly taken up forward position on their missions while her arm mended.  It had been hard for her to adjust to rear command, but unlike some soldiers who revelled in holding point position as a matter of glory or pride, James seemed to accept the strategy out of duty and honor.  In this case, at least it got him further away from the festering dumpsters.

They scouted out this ambush site a few nights ago during a quiet reconnaissance mission.  Shepard had been analyzing the Reaper forces’ patrols and found that despite her first impression that the husks and marauders were mindless killing machines, they were actually highly systematic and organized.  Learning their patterns was the first step in setting up an effective guerilla strike and this alleyway just happened to provide a prime angle for an offensive.

Once they had found their positions, the waiting began.  Shepard surveyed her team critically.  Two Alliance soldiers, two ex- cops, a barista, and a middle-school science teacher made up her tactical strike team.  Not exactly her ideal resistance movement, but at least they could all hold their smuggled weapons without too much quivering.

That was the other part she did not like about being rear command: she could see her whole team in front of her.  She noticed all their idiosyncrasies, their nervous tics, their outward signs of anticipation and fear.  On point, she could feel the support of her comrades behind her, and that was reassuring and empowering.  All her attention focused on the road ahead and the task at hand.

But rear guard revealed their vulnerabilities and distracted her from the mission.  James’ head bobbed forward minutely as he crouched against the crumbling plaster of the alley.  The older cop, Siggurd, shifted his weight from side to side and gripped his pistol too hard.  The younger cop, Mika, repeatedly smoothed down imaginary stray hairs from her ponytail.  Trent let quiet shushing noises escape his lips like a frothing tiny espresso machine.  Mr. Hernandez absent-mindedly touched the brim of his son’s baseball cap and cradled his homemade grenades close to his chest.

And Kaidan, who pushed his fingers through the straggling hairs at the nape of his neck.  It was getting a little scruffy and she wondered idly if she might be able to find a pair of scissors amongst the discarded personal belongings they found all over the city and maybe offer to trim it for him.  It would be nice to stand close to him again.  To feel the warmth of his skin and feel the fluff of his hair…

Just as she was letting herself melt into this delightful little daydream, she felt her team jump to attention.  James signalled that something was approaching.  She held her breath and strained her ears.  Footsteps approached.  Weapons collectively raised in the direction of James’ signal.

“Don’t shoot,” she heard from around the corner.  “I’m human,” the voice continued.

She started to reply, but James beat her to it, “Come out so I can see you.”

A forty-something woman in stained denim overalls edged around the corner with her arms held up.  “My name is Hana,” her voice squeaked and her hands trembled.

“Listen, Hana, we’re in the middle of something here.  You’re going to want to be long gone.”  James pointed with his chin to the barrel of his assault rifle and lowered it slowly.

She gulped and nodded. “Okay, but I need your help.”  She was visibly sweating, but her hands lowered.  James glanced back at Shepard.  She felt conflicted.  The whole reason she wanted to stay on Earth was to help people, but on the other hand this could be a trap.  The word indoctrination beat in her mind.  Was it too soon?  It took months for Benezia to be indoctrinated while in direct contact with Sovereign, but she was a powerful Matriarch.

_Better to err on the side of kindness_ , she heard her mother’s voice in the back of her mind.  When Alma Shepard had been a school teacher on Mindoir, the phrase had been her mantra with her students as well as her family.

Shepard swallowed hard and nodded to James.  The corner of his mouth turned up slightly before waving a hand to the woman to come closer.  He had a soft spot too.  That was another reason why she liked him.  She found herself smiling as she watched James and Hana confer at the end of the alley.  The woman was gesticulating to a nearby building and he was nodding emphatically.  She let out a deep sigh and holstered her pistol.

Suddenly she felt Kaidan’s eyes upon her and the smile melted away from her face.  He had been all business on all their missions, and sullen and withdrawn during downtime.  When he had to make eye contact during briefings, his eyes were always cold and judging.  Other times he just avoided her completely.  She turned her head slowly and was surprised that he did not immediately glance away when their eyes met.  The wrinkles around his eyes softened ever so slightly and she thought she saw a hint of their old twinkle before he cleared his throat and turned to join James.

“Well that was something at least,” she mumbled to herself.

***

The building Hana led them to was probably a nice place before the Reaper invasion.  When she stopped them in the foyer, Shepard could see that the hallways were wide and carpeted with benign framed art of flowers and cityscapes every hundred feet or so.  James had taken point on this mission, and she was happy to let him talk to Hana to get the details of her concerns.  Shepard was a battle hardened soldier, had seen the worst that the galaxy had to offer, but it was still hard to see civilians so grossly affected by war.  

She eased herself closer to the hallway and realized that most of the doors hung idly open while the tattered remains of looted belongings crept out into the carpet that was caked thick with mud and mystery sludge.   This place had definitely seen some action already.  Images of husks swarming through the halls filled her vision.  She imagined the horror of doors being ripped open and families being dragged down the halls as their screams echoed in her ears.  She set her jaw and shook her head.   _I should have done more she chastised herself.  All these people..._

“Shepard,” she heard James call.  She shook her head and the ghosts dissipated.  Turning away from the empty hallway, she found him beckoning her over to where the rest of the team was gathered.  

“What’s the plan?” she asked as she approached.

“Hana says that there are still families holed up in some of the upper apartments, but that the basement is swarming with husks.  As I see it, we’ve got two choices.  Clear out the basement or evacuate the apartments.  Your call, boss.”  

“How many?”

“There’s less than ten families up there,” Hana interjected, “but where will they go?  Those things are everywhere in Vancouver.”

“We don’t know how many husks, Commander,” James chimed in.  Her former title caused a crackle of anger along her spine, and she was about to let it flare out at James, but the overalled woman let out a tiny noise that caught her attention.  She was wringing an old paisley handkerchief in her hands that was wearing thin with the burden of her worry, a worry that quelled Shepard’s spark of indignation.  She breathed in deeply and released.

“Hana, I know that you and your neighbors have been through enough already and you don’t want to move, but this place is dangerous.  Now that they know you’re here, they won’t rest until you’re gone.”  The woman’s eyes went wide and a whimper fell from her lips.  Shepard put her hand on her shoulder reassuringly and met her gaze.  “You have to leave just temporarily.”  She emphasized the word and let it sink in before continuing. “We’re going to fix this.  You have my word.”  Hana searched her expression for a few moments and Shepard thought she might cry, but instead she sucked in a sob before it could escape and nodded her head.

Shepard turned to Kaidan.  “Get on the comm and let our people know that we have some more refugees coming in.”  He nodded in acknowledgement and activated his omnitool.  “James, take the rest of the team upstairs and let Hana show you where the families are hiding.  Find them.  Get them out of here.”

“You got it, boss,” he saluted out of habit and then beckoned to the rest of the team who were watching the door for passing Reaper patrols.  As he walked away, he turned back and asked, “What about you?”

“Me?  I’m going scouting downstairs.”  She drew her pistol and popped in fresh thermal clips.

“Oh no, you are not heading down to Reaper town alone.  Don’t get me wrong, Lola, you’re a hell of a fighter, but you are not soloing with a bum arm.”  He cut the air in front of him with an definitive wave of his hand.

“She won’t have to.” Kaidan moved up beside her while reloading his assault rifle.  Shepard looked to him to gauge his meaning, but he and James were locked in a silent conversation; neither blinked, but furrowed their brows at each other for a long moment.  She did not like the feeling that they were making decisions for her, but they simultaneously relaxed their faces and nodded.  Before she could intercede, Kaidan switched his gaze to her.  “Well?  Those husks won’t kill themselves.”  He shrugged and added, “Unless we’re lucky.  Let’s go.”

 

***

It felt good to shoot reapers in the face, but these particular husks were really satisfying to obliterate.  She and Kaidan had silently come upon a large group milling about amongst the storage units of the apartment building’s basement and luckily had taken them by surprise.  She still missed her Eviscerator, but her pistol aim was still good enough to land a few headshots.  She was careful to mind her healing arm and take cover, but when there was only one weakened husk left standing, she allowed her energy to build up into one glorious biotic charge.  The melee felt like an indulgence in a guilty pleasure long ignored and she could not help but whoop a little at the thrill.

Kaidan started to give her a disapproving glare, but he only got through one shake of his head before a smile crept in.  “You just couldn’t resist, could you?”  He chuckled ever so slightly, making Shepard’s grin widen even more.

“Nope, had to be done.  He was asking for it.”  She felt the last remnants of her biotic energy dissipate away as she holstered her pistol.

“Some things never change,” Kaidan grinned, but his smile promptly melted away and suddenly their whimsy was ground under the heel of awkwardness.  She had the feeling that he regretted the words.

“Kaidan…” she began but then faltered for words.  She had been trying to think of what to say to him for months now.  During her downtime after the suicide mission, she daydreamed about their reconciliation, rehearsed the conversation in the shower, wrote and discarded at least fifty emails, but none of it seemed to produce any coherent words she could muster right now.

“Shepard...”  He sighed heavily as though pushing through his apprehension. “I don’t know what you are.  Or who.  Not since Cerberus rebuilt you.”  His gaze was averted, but he paused and looked at her directly.  “For all I know, you could be their puppet.  Controlled by the Illusive Man himself.”  

She tried not to let the accusation rattle her as his eyes searched hers.  She knew him well enough to know that he was looking for something.  He probably was not even sure what it was, but he probably felt like he would know it if he saw it.

“That’s not fair, Kaidan,” she said.  She moved closer to him and paused to decide whether to try and ease his fears or tear into him for making such a gross accusation.  Then again, she also was not she she could explain it to herself let alone to a skeptic.

“Don’t try to explain it,” he interrupted before she could go any further.  “I don’t think I’d understand anyway.”  He sighed again, more exasperated this time, and his hand came up to rub the back of his neck.

“I just…” he paused and brought the hand back down before making eye contact with her again.  “I just want to know, is the person I followed to hell and back--the person I loved--still in there somewhere?”  

Her chest and throat tightened so ferociously that she was not sure she could make her voice audible, but she managed to whisper, “They didn’t change me Kaidan.”  He nodded almost imperceptibly.  She drew in a deep breath.  She was about to lay her heart bare and all her instincts were shouting at her not to make herself so vulnerable, but she continued with, “They didn't change how I feel about you.”

She thought he might push back against her tenderness with another accusation, or worse leave her altogether, but instead he just searched her expression again.  Finally, she said, “But words won’t convince you, will they?”

He pursed his lips and shook his head. “Probably not,” he said.

While this was not her dream reconciliation, at least it was not an outright refusal either.  She relaxed a little and looked around the musty basement.  They had done good work here, and she still felt satisfied that progress was made, so she quipped, “I didn’t think so.  You were always stubborn.”

“Me?” he rewarded her with a short laugh and a hint of a smile.

She lifted her hand to point an accusatory finger, but before words formed, she noticed a closed door at the end of the storage unit that their flashlights had not discovered in their initial sweep.  Her hand fell in slow motion back down to her pistol and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Kaidan’s expression harden and follow her gaze.  

The door was once a green metal security model that now bore streaks of red corrosion.  There was no doorknob and a hefty bolt lock was the only features on this side.  Kaidan scanned it with his omnitool, but shook his head to indicate that he could not garner any further information from this side.  He shrugged as if to say Well, let’s do this the old fashioned way and put his ear to the door.  His brow furrowed and Shepard held her breath for a tense minute.  When he pulled away, he mouthed the word Nothing.

She bent down to inspect the locking mechanism a little more closely.  It was an older model from before locks were digitally sealed and a plate welded to the door rested firmly against the metal frame to prevent a simple kick in.  Whoever put this door here definitely wanted to keep other people out.

“What now?” Kaidan whispered.  

Shepard laced her fingers and stretched out her arms to crack the knuckles.  Shaking them loose, she reached into her pocket and fished around.  Kaidan cocked his head and raised an eyebrow, but the only explanation she offered was a hushed, “Little trick I learned from a friend.”  She withdrew a tiny bundle wrapped in a black pouch and tugged at the cords to open the cinch.  Turning the bag over, two metal picks dropped into her palm.

She set to work on the lock and sent a silent thank you to her old friend when the lock clicked open after only a moment's work.  Kaidan shook his head incredulously as she slipped a pick into the tiny space between the plate and the doorframe then slowly pulled the door open.

As they eased the door open, they were surprised that a nest of angry husks was not waiting for them on the other side.  Quite to the contrary, a small apartment opened before them.  Although it looked like its last resident left in a hurry, there did not seem to be any signs of looters or reapers amongst the disarray.  A green upholstered couch faced an empty TV stand.  A low ovular coffee table still held the discarded remote controls and a short stack of papers and magazines.  To the left, a tiny kitchenette was littered with some hastily strewn dishware and a cozy little two person wooden table and chairs hugged the wall.  On the far wall, two doors were ajar enough to reveal a tiny bathroom and closet.  Finally, on the far right side of the room, there was an entryway into a meagre bedroom and a small set of stairs leading up to a bulkhead door.  Everything was covered in a fine layer of dust, which led Shepard to further trust that they were the first ones to find it since the invasion began.

She moved hesitantly over to the couch and gave it a tentative pat.  A poof of dust erupted from the surface, but it was otherwise a perfectly normal and benign couch.  She turned on her heel and unceremoniously plopped herself down on the cushions then propped her feet up on the table.  Tucking her hands behind her head, she found Kaidan eying her suspiciously.

“Shepard,” he coughed, waving futilely at the dust cloud, “what are you doing?”

“Just checking,” she said and wriggled in deeper.  It was comfy enough and her feet thanked her for the reprieve from her heavy combat boots.  Kaidan guffawed as she settled herself in.

“Okay, I’ll admit that the couch is ugly, and the place needs a little work, but you have to agree this place will make a great base of operations for our little resistance group.”  She motioned outward towards the apartment like a model showing off a game show prize.

She thought he might shoot the idea down instantly, but as he resurveyed the apartment, he started to nod slowly as if the prospect were not so absurd after all.  Tactically, it was sound: solid barricade door, no exterior windows for husks to smash open, an emergency exit, and since the reapers already believed the building to be empty, it would be easy to move in and out without attracting too much attention.

“You and James can share the bedroom and I’ll hunker down on ol’ dusty here.”  She slapped the couch cushions again sending another cloud of dust into the air.  

“We do need a place to recoup,” he conceded.  

It was enough agreement in her mind to make it a done deal.  “Radio James and have him come see what we found.  Our Resistance movement just got a whole lot more cozy.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At first it seems that living together in their new Resistance base is going smoothly, and it is fine when all three of them are together, but when James is out of the room leaving Shepard and Kaidan alone, it becomes abundantly clear that their reconcilliation is just an awkward truce. However, while on a mission that goes sour, they need each other to get out alive. Perhaps there might be a glimmer of hope after all?

“I shit you not, Lola, that Reaper was massive.”  James extended his arms fully to demonstrate, looked at his hands, and then shook his head and tried to stretch them even further.  “Like loco huge.” 

Shepard snickered as she drank some salvaged soda, but when he wiggled his fingers and raised his eyebrows for emphasis, she choked out a laugh.  She didn’t want to lose any of the precious drink, but she ended up squirting some between her fingers anyway.

“What? You think I’m joking?” he asked as he pulled back in his arms. 

“No!  No, it’s just...”  She wiped her chin then side-eyed the can.  There was definitely a glob of mucusy saliva on the rim from her snorting and she thought she should drain it down the sink, but the twinkle of caffeine lured her in.  With a shrug, she slurped down the rest of the soda.  Catching James’ horrified look, she tried to remember what she had been laughing at before she derailed their conversation with her slightly odious beverage.

The image of James facing down a charging Brute floated back into her mind.  They had done an escort mission that afternoon where they helped some of the local politicians gather for a conference on how to best serve refugees and bolster supply lines.  It had been a huge victory for their little resistance group to form any kind of organized relief efforts, but in order to make it happen, she had to guarantee that every representative would arrive at the meeting location safely.  She had personally scouted the safest routes and put every resistance team member on high alert to deliver on her promise.

Good thing she was always extra cautious because a drop ship off-loaded a swarm of husks and a brute a scant block away from her chosen path.  She was still fighting from the rear with her pistol while her forearm knit back together, but even from the back of the pack, she had heard a collective gasp from her team.

“I had my doubts about those science-fair bombs, but Mr. Hernandez really came through for us today.”  James abandoned her to her musings and turned to Kaidan to discuss the day’s mission.  Kaidan pulled over one of the wooden chairs from the kitchen and was tinkering with a smashed datapad he found that morning.  She and James didn’t mind ol’ Green Dusty’s mustiness, but Kaidan never even laid a hand on the couch. Shepard had grown accustomed to the couch’s charming odor after two nights of sleep on it, and James was perhaps just kind enough not to mention it.

“Yeah,” Kaidan mumbled and turned the datapad over in his hands examining it so closely that it nearly rubbed against his nose.  James’ shoulders slumped at yet another distracted audience and turned back to Shepard who snickered silently at the scene.

“Ah, you two are useless,” he said and stood up.  Shepard tried to look offended at the accusation, but Kaidan just murmured an “uh-huh” and pulled a tiny screwdriver out of his belt.  Throwing up his hands, James retreated around the couch and shut the bedroom door behind him.  She could hear him grumbling for a minute before the Spanish invectives settled down.

Shepard chuckled to herself and settled back onto the couch again.  She knew he wasn’t really angry and in the morning would act as though nothing had happened, so she popped open her last can of soda and sipped it thoughtfully.  The last time she had gone this long without caffeine she had been a veritable corpse in a Project Lazarus lab, so she wanted to savor this treat.  It wasn’t as good as a cup of coffee--hell she’d even take awful Alliance issued instant coffee right now--but it was still a luxurious treat.

She was just letting her mind wander to a daydream where she and her teammate Trent break into an espresso bar so he could whip up a cappuccino for her when she realized that Kaidan was still in the room.  She paused mid sip and glanced sideways at him.  His nose was still to the datapad as he worked that tiny screwdriver into a nearly imperceptible hole in the side.

He had been so excited to find it when they were sweeping the apartments upstairs.  Finding working tech in the city was impossible now, and finding smashed-to-bits tech was easy enough, but coming upon slightly broken tech was a rarity.  Kaidan’s eyes had gone wide as he turned it over in his hands. “I think I can fix this,” he mumbled to James who just shrugged ambivalently.  She had watched the scene unfold from the kitchen just after she’d found the two intact cans of soda and she paused long enough to lean against the door frame to watch him.  He had taken a handkerchief out of his pack and wrapped it so gently around the damaged datapad that it gave her goosebumps.  She so vividly remembered his tenderness that she could feel the ghost of his hands move up her thigh.  It made her knees weak.  He must have noticed her attention upon him because he looked up and said, “This could help us.  I could use this to help with the comm relay.”  His eyes had wrinkled slightly at the edges as he tucked it gingerly into his pack.

“Yeah, Kaidan,” she had said in an unexpectedly hushed tone, “that would be helpful.”  She’d meant it too.  Here she was scrounging for caffeinated beverages and he was thinking of the greater good.  A way to be helpful and useful to others over himself.  It had made her knees slacken even further and she had to catch herself on the doorframe to prevent herself from sliding right onto the floor.

Now that he had time to tinker and work on the datapad for a little bit, he was completely engrossed with the task.  His eyebrows furrowed and his lips pursed in response to the tiny screwdriver’s progress.  After a few moments, the tiny port he’d been adjusting clicked into place and he breathed out heavily in satisfaction.  Lowering the device down to his lap, he leaned back onto the wooden chair and closed his eyes.  She loved to see him work like this, and while she knew she shouldn’t be openly watching him this way, he didn’t seem to notice her attention.

It had only been three years since they’d met, but Shepard noticed that the Major was starting to grey around the temples.  The wrinkles that used to form around his eyes when he smiled were permanent now, and his hands seemed to have a few more scars.  She had always found him to be incredibly handsome, but he wore the adversities of these last few years so well that perhaps he was even more so now.  She felt herself staring at his hands and remembered her daydream from earlier about his fingers trailing up her thigh and the gooseflesh it had caused started to return. 

“Hey, uh, Shepard,” his husky voice interrupted her, and she felt her cheeks warm at the thought that he had just caught her staring lasciviously at his hands.  “Where did James go?”  She let out a quick breath and the warmth drained from her face when she realized he either didn’t notice her stares or was letting her get away with it.

“Bed.  About 20 minutes ago.” She smiled when his head turned towards the door with a blank expression on his face.

“Oh. I guess I didn’t notice.  I got wrapped up in fixing this datapad.”  He found the tiny screwdriver still in his hand and tucked it back away into his belt.

She nodded, but couldn’t find any words to reply.  Did he remember the nights he had snuck into her quarters as vividly as she did?  Could he still feel her fingers meandering through his chest hair? Did the memories quicken his pulse as they did to her?  She swallowed hard as his eyes darted away.

He cleared his throat and stood up.  Replacing the chair, he moved silently back around the couch and put a hand on the doorknob to the bedroom he shared with James.  She thought she saw a moment of hesitation before he turned the handle and slipped inside, wordlessly closing the door behind him.

 

***

Shepard was trying to eke out a few more precious moments of sleep, but something was pulsing in her brain.  She slung an arm over her eyes and groaned, rolled over to face the upholstery, and even thrust the thin pillow she used over her head, but to no avail.  Finally, she threw off the shabby blanket and sat up irritably.  Sleeping on the old dusty couch had been quaint for the first few weeks, but it was no longer cute and she longed for the cozy quarters of the Normandy where she could stretch her legs out fully and prop her head up with something more than a threadbare mystery stained salvaged pillow.  She thought wistfully of the mornings that Kelly would bring her a cup of steaming hot coffee along with the morning reports and data.  She licked her lips tentatively hoping to get a phantom taste of delectable coffee.  Instead, her tongue was met with cracked lips and the jarring realization that she still had not found any lip balm.

Grumbling audibly, she rubbed her face briskly with her hands and cracked open her eyelids.  The apartment was casting uncharacteristic shadows so she squinted around to locate the source.  She internally scolded herself for leaving on a flashlight somewhere that was eating up precious battery life, but paused mid rant when she realized that her flashlight was benignly resting on the table where she had left it last night.  Her ears instinctively pricked up and her heart sunk in a moment of panic.   _Is someone here?_

Swallowing hard, Shepard turned slowly towards the tiny kitchen.  She reached silently for the pistol stashed under the cushion, but just as her fingers grazed the cool metal, she caught her breath and froze in surprise.

The kitchen light was on.

It took her a solid thirty seconds to make sense of it.  The light?  was on?  as in working electricity?  She shook her head as though to awaken herself from a dream, but when the lightbulb remained aglow, she found herself inching towards the effulgence.  The overhead light had long ago lost the encasement that diffused the bulb’s light, so now it hung bare.  She could see the tiny filaments alight inside the frosted glass, so she reached out a tentative hand to see if she could feel the heat.  Even stretched up on her toes, her fingertips were a few inches away from the light, but there it was, warming the pads steadily.  Her mouth hung open in awe as though it were her first time ever experiencing such a wondrous and magical thing, then she heard a distant pop and the bulb quieted.

Tiny dots danced around the room as she searched the apartment for someone to share this remarkable moment with.  As if to punctuate the event, a snore reverberated from the bedroom and echoed through the now dark apartment.  She thought of waking James, shaking him from sleep, and have him feel the still warm bulb just to prove that she did not dream the entire thing, to have a witness to the miracle she just witnessed.  In fact, she was halfway to the door when she realized James would probably humor her middle of the night ranting, but what about Kaidan?  There was a time when she would not have hesitated to share something like this with him and instantly she felt a stab of guilt that she had thought of James first.  But no, this particular brand of quirky was not a good idea to inflict upon her estranged boyfriend.  He still had no interest in conducting any conversations outside of business for the resistance and even that acquiescence she knew was only in deference to Anderson’s orders.

She sighed heavily and retreated back to ol’ Green Dusty, picking up her thin pillow and blanket along the way.

 

***

 

“Oh yeah, I saw the light come on once too.  Last week,”James said with a shrug.

She squinted at him incredulously, ““You did?”

“Yeah, no big deal, you know.  It comes on.  It goes off.  Kind of a tease, if you ask me,” he said.  Kaidan harrumphed and murmured in agreement.

“Why am I the last to know these things?” she asked, groaning.

“Maybe I should start calling you ‘Loco’?”  He snickered as she shook her head disapprovingly.

“You know what, Vega?  Just for that, you’re on salvage duty with Trent and Mika today.”  She let him process the new assignment and relished the way his face sunk.  There was probably a special circle of James’ personal hell that involved rifling through abandoned apartments looking for supplies for the resistance.  She knew he had grown a taste for leading strike missions instead, and she had to admit that he was a strong leader, but that smart ass comment merited at least a small reprisal.  She met his gaze, anticipating that he would challenge her decision.  He did not shy from her eye contact and for a long moment she thought for sure he would call her out on the fleeting authority she held over him.  She softened her glare just a little and tacitly reminded him they were friends.

“ _Joder_ ,” he grumbled in assent.  He slung his rifle over his shoulder and motioned to his team to follow him out of the foyer of the apartment.

With that, Shepard turned to the rest of her team.  “That leaves the rest of us to sweep the bus station on 22nd Street.  Intel says it’s a hive of activity and we need to clear that route for evac of refugees.  We’re going in quiet, but contact is imminent.”  She paused to look each person in the eye.  They nodded, silently acknowledging the danger of the mission, but Kaidan shuffled uneasily from foot to foot.

She felt a pang of nostalgia for the lieutenant who was skittish around his CO when they first served together on the Normandy.  The memory of how he used to avoid eye contact unless protocol or manners demanded it made her throat tighten up a little.  Back then, he resisted making eye contact for fear that he would seem too eager for her attention, but now she knew his aversion was because of his lingering mistrust.  She thought she could grow accustomed to this evasive treatment, give him time to work out his feelings and rebuild his trust, but she had to bite her lip and press the flesh between her teeth hard to pull back the swelling pressure in the back of her throat.  Turns out, she couldn’t get used to being so close and yet so far from him.

She felt a drop of blood form at the corner of her mouth and remembered that she was in the middle of giving orders for a mission.  Refusing to let redness creep into her cheeks, she wiped the blood with the corner of her sleeve and cleared her throat.  Testing her voice, she found it still too wavery to be taken with any kind of authority, so she closed her mouth and opted for a silent gesture to move the team out into the street.

Siggurd and Mr. Hernandez immediately turned towards the door, but Kaidan lingered.  She watched as he pressed the toe of his combat boots into the floral carpet of the apartment foyer.  He took a breath and looked like he wanted to say something to her.  She recognized the signs of his worry: fidgeting, rubbing his neck apprehensively, and his eyebrows coming together to form a giant wrinkle above his nose.  She wished he would yell at her, accuse her of cavorting with Cerberus again, insist that she was unfit for leading anymore, anything rather than this silent treatment.  At least if he yelled she would know what she was up against, try to reason with him.  But this?  His toe circles slowed and she braced herself for a barrage, but instead he abruptly turned on his heel and marched out the door without a word.

_You can’t negotiate with silence_ , she told herself before following her team out the door and into the Reaper infested streets.

 

***

 

When things turn sideways, there is a brief moment--a tipping point--where the balance of power shifts and suddenly the winners become the losers, and in war, the losers end up dead.  Shepard has developed a knack for sensing this exact moment and today, when there was only one thermal clip left on her belt and Siggurd was on his second medigel, she knew that point was breached.  Ducking into a small alcove, her chest heaved and she fought to regain control of her lungs.   _One…two…three…_ she counted to even her breaths and refocus.

Things had been going smoothly when they first arrived at the bus station.  A small throng of husks were milling about, so she had fanned out the team to flank them and make short work of their task.  However, as they opened fire, she had realized a critical error: the bus station was no longer a simple bench with a plexiglass shelter and a ticket booth, but had been expanded underground by the Reapers.  When the first shriek of an attacking husk broke the quiet morning, three more large reapers emerged from the newly dug tunnel.  Unlike any other reaper she had seen, they had five glowing eyes and tumorous looking growths on their shoulders and backs.  Although they had neutralized the small cluster of husks, these new creatures seemingly ignored Shepard’s strike team and instead scurried to the corpses.  She saw their enormous guns, but found herself frozen aghast when the cancerous monsters ripped into the fallen husks and devoured their flesh.  That critical moment of terror was the beginning of the end of their victory at the bus station.

_Four…_ she inhaled.

_Five…_ she exhaled.

The pounding slowed and she could again hear the sounds of bullets pelting the wall around her.  “Stupid, stupid!” she reprimanded herself.  Images of her gape-mouthed team being dragged off by reapers floated across her vision and her stomach revolted.  Shepard swallowed the bile that rose in her throat and pushed aside the tormenting inner voices.  If she could pull their asses out of this, there would be time for plaguing guilt later.  Even though the tide had turned, she refused to concede.  They might not achieve their mission, but if she could get them out alive, it was victory enough for now.

She waited for the spray of bullets to slow, then leaned out of cover to survey the situation.  The creature with the enormous gun was powering up another shot, but before she pulled back, she spotted Mr. Hernandez crouched behind a dumpster, utterly pinned down and in desperate need of cover fire.  Kaidan was holding off an onslaught of husks by intermittent bursts of biotic throws and assault rifle fire.  Siggurd was nowhere to be seen.  She tried not to assume the worst and instead strategized an escape route with the brief glance she had managed to catch.

Loading up her last thermal clip, she mentally reminded herself that she had just thirty shots to make this plan work.  She stretched out the fingers on her wounded arm and felt the strain of tight still-knitting tissue burn slightly.  Shepard nodded her head resolutely, braced herself, and when the debris of concrete sprayed past her, she rolled out of the alcove and landed two shots right in the creatures fifth glowing eye.  As it staggered backwards, her body crackled to life with blue energy and she unleashed a biotic charge.  The creature grappled for the wall and nearly got its gun up to fire, but she lunged forward and used the remaining energy to grab it and thrash it to the ground.  Two more precious shots in the monster’s cranium thudded before she crouched behind the bus station plexiglass.

Pulling in a hard breath, she winced and pulled her arm into her chest.   _Part of the plan is pushing through the pain_ , she reminded herself.  She flexed open her hand and felt the burn of exertion blaze up her arm.

“Shepard!” she heard Kaidan’s voice echo off the bus station walls.  With a quick look she determined that the reapers that had Mr. Hernandez pinned down weren’t making any forward progress, so she sprinted out from behind the shelter and behind a burned out car towards the voice.  Kaidan was facing down a line of four husks and his barrier was blinking out.  He popped out a depleted thermal clip and was futilely searching around his feet as they lurched towards him.  Even at this distance, she could see sweat beading on his forehead.

She stormed forward across the street and instinctively pulled back her arm to unleash a shockwave that bowled the cluster of husks to their feet.  She could barely feel her fingers as they closed around the trigger, but with one precision shot in each grotesque face, she cleared the path before her.

After making the final sprint up the sidewalk, she rolled into the alleyway Kaidan had retreated into.  They both pressed against the wall and pulled in ragged breaths.  The burning in her arm melted away into a tingling numbness that was slightly less distracting and yet more disconcerting.  She tentatively tested her trigger finger and found that she could only compel it to partially close.  “Damn,” she whispered then let her head roll backwards to thump off the brick as she slowly slid down the wall to crouching.

“Thanks,” Kaidan murmured between panting breaths.

“Yeah, sure.”  She jammed shut her eyes and willed the blood back into her hand.

“You saved my hide back there.”  She heard his armor scrape against the brick as he slid down next to her.

“Well, it’s a good hide, so it was worth saving.”  Her lips tugged at a smile.  It was an old joke between them and probably would have been funnier if he didn’t despise her and their hides actually were out of the fire.  She expected a gruff retort or a silent rebuff, but instead he sighed wistfully.  She cracked open an eye and saw him looking at her with soft eyes and a slightly cocked head.

“Glad you still think so.”

Her cheeks probably would have flared up if not for the sound of bullets pelting the wall just around the corner.  Pushing up on her feet, she slid back up the wall and started to creep towards the street.  She didn’t get but a few inches before she felt a hand on her elbow.

“Uh, Shepard, what do you think you’re doing?” His voice was gravelly, but earnest.

“Siggurd and Mr. Hernandez are still out there,” she replied without looking backward and pulled her elbow from his grasp.

“You’re no good to them dead.” Her throat clenched as she fought to find equally vitriolic words to sling back at him, but then he added more softly, “You know I’m right, Shepard.”  His hand came back up to her elbow and gently tugged her towards him.

“I can’t just let them die out there!”  She whipped around to face him, daring him to challenge her.

“Now, calm down.”  He spoke gently and lowered one knee to the ground.  “That’s not what I’m suggesting.”  He pulled off his pack, opened it, and pulled out a small medkit.

“We don’t have time for this Kaidan.  I’m fine.”  The stab of guilt for letting herself get in this situation was worse than the numbness pulsing in her arm.  She turned once again to leave.

“Shepard, stop being so damned stubborn for a minute and listen to me.  Let me handle this.  Okay?”  His touch remained gentle, but his eyes demanded her acquiescence.  Were it anyone else in the galaxy, she wasn’t sure she could relinquish control like this, but she felt herself give one terse nod.

Surrendering her arm to his care, she blinked back the water forming in her eyes.  When she had been a child on Mindoir, she’d gotten into quite a few scuffles with the other colony kids.  She could hold her own against even much older and bigger children, but once her mother pulled her out of the fray and the fists slowed, she would always burst into tears.  Fat droplets would stream behind her as she ran back to their farm, thrust open the door, and flung herself upon her bed where she could let the emotions pour out in privacy.  She hated that her body processed emotions in this way, even more so that she never grew out of it.

Trying to focus her eyes to inhibit the flow, she watched as Kaidan pulled off her gauntlet.  The shirting underneath was splotched with blood.  The exertion of the battle had torn open the stitching she’d received back on the Normandy.  Unflinching, he cut the sleeve with scissors from the medkit and tenderly pulled the fabric out of the congealing wounds.

“I’m going to need to restitch this when we get back to base,” he dabbed at the wound with a pad of something that stung then piled on some gauze.

“I should’ve done better,” she confessed without looking up.

“You did what you could with what you knew,” he reassured her as he started to wind gauze around her arm.  Her gaze flicked to his hands.  Outside of his gauntlets, they were still surprisingly clean.  The little swirls of dark hair around his knuckles were just as she remembered them.  A long time ago he had let her smooth them down in a moment of wordless tenderness.  She wondered if despite everything else that had changed if they were still as soft.  She let her eyes travel up his arm and shoulders to his face.  Sweat and dirt clung around his hairline and a trail of blood splattered his cheek.  The lines in his forehead were highlighted by the grime of battle and perhaps a few more wrinkles had formed around his eyes these last two years.  She let her mind wander further to a little daydream where she could cup his face with her one good hand and stroke her thumb along those lines.  Maybe he would turn his chin towards her and she could raise herself closer to him…

“Finished,” he announced interrupting her reverie.  Her eyes refocused to find him looking at her again.  She didn’t dare to check, but she was pretty sure his hands were still cupping her arm.

“How’s it feel?”

“Ah… good.  Better.  Thank you.”  She wasn’t sure if it really was better, but she was fairly certain that as he withdrew his hands, his touch lingered and traced along her arm and down her hand.  His whisky eyes held her as though he were searching within her, then darted over her shoulder.  Blue energy started to form around him, but as she moved to look behind her, he lept up and biotically threw something back out into the street.  She heard a loud crunch as it hit the ground and scraped across the pavement.

“Thermal clip,” he demanded and outstretched his hand.  She deftly withdrew her pistol and rather than pop out the clip, placed the whole weapon into his waiting hand. 

“22 shots left.” He nodded grimly and curled his fingers around the grip.  His barrier ebbed across his whole body as he stepped out of the alleyway into the street.  She pressed herself tighter against the wall and crept to the edge.  Weaponless and with her biotics offline, she wasn’t sure what she hoped to do, but she had to watch.

As she got closer, she could hear the unique sound of biotic energy and four shots from her pistol, but by the time she made it to the corner, the flurry had subsided.  Fearing the worst, she took a deep breath and looked into the street.  Kaidan was bent over a motionless five-eyed reaper.  He stood up with two more thermal clips in his hand.  Placing one on his belt, he skillfully slid the other into his assault rifle and turned back towards her.  The sun glinted off a building behind him so that as he strode towards her, he was like one of those silhouetted heroes triumphantly returning from war in the vids.

He arrived back at her side, handed her pistol back, and said, “18 shots left.”

“I know,” she replied dreamily, “I counted.”

 His mouth turned up into a quick smile before returning to business.  “Let’s go find the rest of the team.”  She held the pistol and tested her grip.  It was still tingling with numbness, but at least her fingers complied when she curled them around the trigger.

“And Shepard?” he said, “Take it easy on the biotics for now, okay?  I’ve got you covered.”

 

 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Home bound by her injury, Shepard tries to cope with being alone with her thoughts while her team continues to fight reapers and help refugees in Vancouver for the Resistance.
> 
> But also Kaidan brings home a gift, there's a dancing competition, fresh brewed coffee, and a reconciliation in the dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning: some mention of self-harm
> 
> Art for this chapter commissioned by the ungodly talented OneMoonCircles.

The apartment was dark and Shepard was alone, but she didn’t want to use any more of the lantern’s battery to light it.  At least that’s what she told herself, but really the darkness gave her space to think, as well as a chance to examine her injured arm.   She was slowly unwinding her bandages to feel the fresh stitches and let Kaidan’s voice from the yesterday come back to her.

“Not exactly my expertise,” Kaidan admitted when he was midway through patching her up, “but they’ll do the trick.”  The corner of his mouth twitched as if he were about to smile, but it relaxed as he concentrated again, as the needle hovered over her skin and he slowly traced the length of the wound looking for the right spot to replace her stitches.  The originals had been evenly spaced in a neat row, but the skin had been torn away in so many places that it left him few options but to zigzag around.

“That’s okay,” she said, “It’ll make the scar more interesting.  Make it stand out from all the others.”  She meant to put him at ease, maybe even coax out a chuckle, but he just nodded grimly and pulled the thread in silence.  She tried not to read too much into his behavior then, but alone in the dark apartment, there was plenty of time and darkness to dwell.

She sighed deeply to shake the memory.  Running her finger up and down the puckered skin of her forearm, she wondered how Anderson’s negotiations on the Citadel were going.  She tried to hear the Turian Councilor’s voice form the words, “Of course we’ll help,” but even her imagination couldn’t conjure them.  She knew there would be resistance to aid Earth and that Anderson would do his best to convince them, but the thought made the last vestiges of hope slip out of her heart and crawl away into the familiar shadowy corners of self-doubt.

She had felt so sure of her decision to stay on Earth in the beginning, but what had she really accomplished?  Their Resistance movement was still growing and had helped to coordinate efforts in Vancouver, but her search for groups in other cities was proving futile without reliable comm relays.  Alliance leadership had tried to keep connected, but she had the sinking suspicion that all of humanity was on the ropes and she wasn’t even in the boxing ring...

Feeling along her arm in the dark, she paused and pressed the pad of her finger against one of her new stitches until she winced in pain.  It was an old trick she’d developed after Akuze to force her mind back into the here and now, to feel the ache as a reminder that she was still here, and to stop her spirit from circling the drain.  Just a pinch here or a fingernail stab there, nothing too serious as she never drew blood, but fresh wounds made the process quicker and more satisfying.  She was well aware that this behavior was like standing above a gaping maw that slowly pulled her inwards, but she had the strength of will to resist it, to step backwards rather than reel forwards.  For now, at least.

At some point during her dark worries, Shepard must have let her head droop down to rest on her good forearm because when she heard the door’s lock click, she bolted upright and nearly fell out of her chair.  Her fingers instinctively curled around the pistol she’d left on the table, but they relaxed when she recognized the familiar footfalls of her roommates.  She felt around for the lantern with trembling hands and clicked it back on as they swung the door open.  Putting on her well-practiced “everything-is-fine” face, she propped her chin on her hand and relaxed her brow.  At the last second, she remembered that she had unwrapped her arm, so she tucked it on her lap and out of view just as James and Kaidan came into the apartment.

“Seriously?” James asked as he threw his ammo belt down on the dusty green couch.  Her throat clenched as she searched for a reasonable excuse for whatever he was about to accuse her of.

“Why not?” Kaidan said and she exhaled, realizing they were too distracted to question her about her day alone.

“You’re a grown man,” James said as he unbuckled his gauntlets.

“We’re not exactly in a position to be picky.  The ones I’m using now are threadbare and these are in much better shape,” Kaidan said.  He put down his salvaging satchel on the low coffee table and started to rummage through it.  The familiarity of their banter allowed her lingering darkness dissipate.

“Listen, man, I’ve gotta be straight with you.”  Vega breathed in deeply, readying himself for his confession.  Kaidan seemed undeterred and started pulling items from his bag, mostly various over-the-counter pharmaceuticals, some electronic odds and ends for repairs, and batteries.  Exhaling slowly, James continued, “It’s weird, okay?  A man sleeping on kiddie sheets.  I’m just saying.”  

As if on cue, Kaidan pulled a bundle of blue cloth from the bag.  They looked normal enough from the kitchenette, so she didn’t see what the big deal was.

“Say what you will, Lieutenant, but when you’re cold and the bedbugs are gnawing on you, I’ll have the last laugh,” Kaidan said, and  James snorted in reply and waved him off before retreating into the bedroom.  

Kaidan turned and brought the bundle into the kitchen, setting it on the table in front of her.  Upon closer inspection, she had to press her hand to her mouth to stifle a laugh.  The package in question was a set of kids space-themed sheets complete with tiny white rocket ships and five cornered stars.

“Shepard, feel how soft this is,” Kaidan said as he passed a corner to her.  Rubbing the fabric between her thumb and forefinger, she nodded politely but couldn’t risk removing the hand clamped on her mouth.  “Hear that, James?” he called over his shoulder, “The Commander says they’re nice.”

It was a bit of a stretch, but she had to admit that the groan coming from the bedroom was delicious.  She snickered behind her hand and Kaidan’s eyes wrinkled as he gave a genuine smile.  He turned to look at her and she felt instantly intoxicated.  It never ceased to amaze her how much brighter the world could be when they were together, but she also felt a stab of guilt at her earlier darkness.  She let her hand drop away from her lips and fall upon her secretly unbandaged arm below the table.

Seeming not to notice, Kaidan turned his attention back to his space sheets and started to untangle them.  It wasn’t until then that she noticed the bundle was covering something.  Finally finding her voice, she asked, “What you got there, Kaidan?”

“The best part,” he said with another grin.  As the planets and rockets fell away, a dingy white appliance and a ball of tissue paper emerged.  She tilted her head and squinted.  It seemed like some sort of pre-contact kitchen appliance that a colony kid like her would never recognize.  He pushed the papered ball towards her and pulled out the other chair to sit next to her.

Lifting the package, she was surprised at its weight.  As she pulled away the tissue, she heard the familiar clink of ceramic and all but ripped the remaining paper away.  She withdrew two blue mugs with stylized black icons on them.  Turning them over in her hands, she gasped loudly when she recognized the symbols.

“Commemorative first human Spectre edition,” he whispered.

She ran a finger over the etching in disbelief.  “How on Earth…” she couldn’t even finish the question, but flicked her gaze to his waiting eyes.  

They were soft and twinkling when he sighed and said, “Just lucky, I guess.”

Her heart thumped loudly in her chest at the thoughtfulness of his gift.  He was thinking of her and that brought the blood into her cheeks.  Words of gratitude formed in her throat, but before she could say anything, she was hit with a sudden whoosh of realization about the little white appliance he had also brought.  She flipped open the little hatch at the front, causing three tiny brown grains to tumble outward, and just to confirm her suspicions, she leaned forward and sniffed the small compartment.  Her eyes widened and she heard Kaidan chuckle lowly.

“A coffee maker?” she said, squealing like a kid opening a birthday gift.  

“Yeah, I can’t believe I found one and it seems to work.  Well, it would if the power was still operating.”  He rubbed his neck and looked down.  “I know it’s silly.”

The noise of her chair skidding backwards interrupted him, and before she could think of the consequences, she encircled his shoulders with her arms and pressed her cheek against the back of his hair.  It was pure and without intention, but she felt his shoulders stiffen under her embrace and she realized too late that her hug was completely inappropriate.  She pulled away quickly and stepped backwards out of the kitchenette.  Hands found her hair and she tangled her fingers roughly within as she withdrew and stammered out words that she hoped comprised some sort of an apology.  She wanted to throw herself off a cliff, yet flinging herself into bed in her private  quarters on the Normandy for a night of self-loathing would have been just as good, but it was just her green dusty couch and an open living room with nothing to shield her from Kaidan’s glare.  She was pacing erratically, looking for a hole to crawl into, and finally deciding on the bathroom when Kaidan’s voice pierced her inner monologue.

“Shepard!”  He spoke firmly, stepping forward to grab her shoulders.  She tried to pull free, but he tightened his grip and said her name again, more softly this time.  She froze in place and prepared herself for a severe lecture culminating in the ruination of any progress towards their rebuilding friendship.  But instead, he made a consoling shushing noise, petting her shoulder.  Forcing open one eye, she found him trying to meet her gaze.

“I’m really sorry, Kaidan…” her voice trailed away as his hands came away and folded across his chest.

“Shepard,” he said and sighed heavily.  “It’s okay.  It’s fine.  Really.”  

She didn’t believe him, but searching his eyes, she saw no malice or deceit, so she relented and nodded.   “I--I should thank you.  For the coffee maker.  And the mugs,” she whispered as her eyes melted away from his gaze “They’re really great, Kaidan.”

“You’re welcome, Shepard,” he said.  Then after a long moment where her mind scrambled for the least awkward way to part, he cleared his throat and added, “Do you need me to wrap your arm up again?”

Acutely aware that her naked arm was revealed, she tucked it behind her back and said, “No, I can do it.  Thanks.”  She took one step backwards and moved around him towards the kitchenette where her bandages lay in a pile on the table.  It was only now that she realized he probably noticed them immediately when he’d come in earlier as she hadn’t had the forethought to tuck them away, but at least it now gave her a convenient escape.  

Before she began the process of re-wrapping her arm, she paused and grabbed Kaidan’s new sheets.  She outstretched her good arm to return them, but before she could turn, the bedroom door had already clicked shut.

***

“Boss, you’ve been babysitting that thing for two days now.” James was gearing up for a solo night reconnaissance mission while she sat at the kitchen table with her coffee maker.   He must be nervous about going out alone , she thought.  In the three weeks she had known and worked with him, she’d come to realize that he mother-hens under pressure.  

“I only need three minutes,” she replied.  She looked over her set-up carefully, the scavenged grounds, filters, and mugs were all in order and ready for her to sweep into action as soon as the power flickered to life.

“That’s two minutes longer than it usually gives us.”  He shook his head and pursed his lips like a parent trying to dissuade a rambunctious toddler.  He pulled on the last of his gear, then triple checked his thermal clips, clicked one into place, and rolled his shoulders.  

“You were wrong about the sheets, Vega.  Maybe you’re wrong about this too?” She gave him a sugary smile.

“They’re really comfy,” Kaidan called from the bedroom.  

James made a disgusted noise to mask a chuckle then shouldered his assault rifle.  “If you two clowns are done, I’m headed out.”  His hand paused midair as he reached for the door handle and his eyes dropped to the thin carpet.

“Seriously though, James,” she lowered her voice and waited until he raised his gaze to meet hers, “You got this.  You’re a hell of a soldier.”

He nodded wordlessly and exited, letting the door click loudly behind him. 

Just as his footsteps faded, the lightbulb above her flickered on.  Leaping to action, she switched the coffee maker on and placed her new Spectre mug under the spout.  “C’mon, c’mon…” she muttered while the appliance started warming the water.  She focused on the tiny red light that indicated her coffee dreams were imminent.  Thirty seconds later, the LED and the lightbulb both quieted as she heard the telltale  pop  of the power outage.

“Damn it!” she grumbled and pounded her fist on the table.  

***

Shepard fiddled with a grimy deck of worn playing cards at the kitchen table, half-playing a Turian version of solitaire that Garrus sent her vids of while she was on lockdown.

“This version is played by soldiers in the field waiting for action and veterans on Palaven remembering action,” he explained at the time via vidcom.  After only a month of being relieved of duty, she had been desperate for any kind of distraction, and she appreciated this token of understanding.  It had been their last correspondence before he left for some secret assignment straight from the Primarch.  She missed his unique blend of sarcasm and camaraderie.  Hell, during those months in jail, she even caught herself missing the rusty iron smell of Tuchanka.  To say she had been bored was an understatement.  ‘Persistently comatose’ might have been a more appropriate term.

This little reprieve of action was not wholly unfamiliar, but she had no interest in decending into that kind of apathy again, so she found herself at Kaidan’s bedroom door rapping lightly.

“Yeah?” she heard from within.  It had only been two days since her hugging faux pas, so her hand trembled as it dropped back to her side.

“Hey, uh, Kaidan.  Would you maybe wanna play some cards or something?”  She tried to steady her voice, but it wavered a little when she said his name.  She swallowed hard and waited a long moment for a response from within.  She listened acutely for a rustle or voice from behind the door, but after a minute, she lowered her head and took a retreating step backward.  As she started to turn, a soft click stopped her in her tracks.  Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Kaidan emerge from the darkened bedroom.

“Sure, Shepard, but you know I’m awful at cards.” He didn’t smile, just buried his hands in the pockets of his hoodie, so she nodded once and turned back towards the kitchenette.  Once her face was away from his gaze, she mouthed a silent  phew .

The battery-powered lantern on the counter lit their path in the otherwise dark apartment until the bare lightbulb above the two-person metal table warmed and spread soft white light.

She started to run the ten paces to the coffeemaker, but after only two strides the bulb had dimmed.  She stuck out her bottom lip and harrumphed as it flickered on and off several more times before her feet touched the linoleum.  Pulling out her chair, she plopped herself down in front of the appliance again and held her finger over the start button.

Kaidan pulled out the other chair and eased himself down.  “Huh.  Wonder where all the power is coming from?” He activated his omnitool and flipped through several data feeds in quick succession.  Shepard watched as his eyes darted through the figures and charts and sighed discreetly to herself as his eyebrows raised and lowered over interesting bits of information.  She was just about to indulge herself in another daydream fantasy about interrupting his work with a tiny metal table top strip show when it suddenly occurred to her that he was actually accessing data.  The Reapers had disrupted all communication immediately before their invasion, in fact Kaidan had spent all his downtime in the first three days of their assignment trying vainly to connect to any network at all.  

“You have access?” She squinted at the scrolling data trying to make out information as it zoomed by.

“Tapped into localized transmissions using that datapad I fixed,” he answered without looking up.  “Weather reads, EMF detectors, IR scanners.  Must’ve been a lot of amateur meteorologists in Vancouver...” his voice trailed away to scrutinize a particularly interesting piece of the read out.

“That’s really clever, Kaidan, good work.” She gave up trying to read the text and instead focused back on him.  She found herself staring at the tip of his finger as it flicked through menus and found her table-top show daydream starting to evolve into something a little more scintillating.  Idly remembering that Kaidan’s hands were expert at more than just navigating tech, she squeezed her thighs together and closed her eyes.

“Thanks, Shepard,” he said out of the blue just as she was getting to the best part of her fantasy.  His voice startled her, but as she opened her eyes, she realized he was just belatedly responding to her earlier comment.  She’d seen him deep in data land many times before, and he would often lose himself so deeply that he was more talking to himself than her.  

“I love watching you work,” she whispered to his furrowed brow and sunk her chin into her hand.

The data feed closed suddenly and Kaidan looked up to her.  “What?”

“What?”  She startled herself upright.  Fear immediately swooped upon her.  What if he had heard her ridiculous pinning?  This could get her into even deeper trouble with him.  

“Oh, I just thought you said something to me.”  He looked at her quizzically.

“Who me?”  She stupidly pointed at herself and tried to look innocent.

“You and I are the only ones here, Shepard.”  He raised an eyebrow and searched her intently. 

She started to channel her inner Joker to come up with a witty diversion, but luckily she was saved by the power coming on again.  Instead of a rational explanation, she squealed,  “Coffee!”, clicked the power button, and then licked her lips anticipatorily.

Ten seconds later, the light dimmed and she groaned.  Squeezing shut her eyes, she rubbed them slowly.

“Huh,” Kaidan murmured a couple seconds later.

“What?” she asked with her fingers still over her face.

“Look.”

Opening one eye, she found the bare bulb above them flickering on and off repeatedly.  “Well, this is new,” she said.  

Kaidan reached over to the lantern and clicked it off.  They watched the light fluctuate above them for a few silent moments together until Kaidan sighed and said, “Reminds me of that awful club in the Wards.  What was the name of that place?” 

“In the Zakera Wards?”

“Yeah, the one we got to stake out looking for Fist.”

“Chora’s Den?”  She laughed.  “How is this like that pit?”  She looked away from the bulb down to his waiting gaze.  

“They had a strobe light, didn’t they?  For the dancers?”

“Oh, you remember those dancers, do you?” Even in the winking light, she could make out the color that crept up his neck.

“Well, yeah, they were pretty memorable,” he admitted and smiled.

“Ash never let you forget it either.”  She cleared her throat and did her best Ashley impersonation, “Hey Lieutenant, put your tongue back in your mouth.”

“...before you trip on it,” he finished and they both grinned.

“You know they only had that strobe light to mask the awful dancing in that club, right?”

“You’re one to talk, Shepard.” He tilted his chair back and folded his arms over his chest as though settling in for the onslaught that bringing up her dancing usually garnered.

“Low blow, Alenko.” She shook her head disapprovingly, but he chuckled and she couldn’t help but follow suit.

“Has your dancing gotten any better since then?”  He looked her squarely in the eye.  It was a challenge, and being directly confronted was her weakness, so she pushed back the chair and got to her feet.

“Okay, Kaidan, you got it.  You and me.  Right now.  Dance off.”  She couldn’t believe these words had just come out of her mouth.  Was she crazy?  The flickering of the light must be hypnotizing her to succumb to bold and stupid whims.  “Got any music on that thing?” She found herself pointing to his omnitool.

“Seriously?” he asked.  She nodded and turned her wrist so she could beckon him onto their makeshift dance floor.  He seemed to be measuring her sincerity as he looked at her, so she maintained a firm expression even though she could feel a bead of sweat run down her neck.

“I sure do,” he finally said and flipped open the device.  Within seconds, a familiar beat emanated from the tiny speakers.  She tried to recall the name of the song, but got distracted as Kaidan rose from his chair and stretched out his arms causing his muscles to flex under his tight Alliance issued t-shirt.

Refusing to be distracted by his biceps, Shepard shook the naughty thoughts from her head and launched into her best dance moves.  It was like a starting gun that signaled the start of a race as Kaidan immediately started his dance routine with a clap of his hands.  She could feel her hips swaying and her feet were doing something, but she honestly had no clue what she was doing.  Kaidan twisted his hips and pulled his elbows in close.  It looked pretty good by her standards.

“C’mon, Shepard, at least try to move to the rhythm,” he teased.  “Like this.”  He demonstrated by tapping his heel on the linoleum to some indiscernible pattern.  She couldn’t fathom how that fit the music as she thought she  had  been swaying to the beat, so she switched her tactic and swung her arms around a little more.  She tried to match the waving of her arms to her hip movements, and she felt pretty damn cool until Kaidan burst out laughing.  She wanted to feel undeterred, but her shoulders slumped as she realized she must have looked like a writhing Presidium-fish on a Krogan’s dinner plate.  

“Kaidan, I…” she was about to concede defeat, but the song rose to its crescendo and he shook his head at her unspoken surrender.  

He closed the small distance between them and placed his hands on her shoulders.  “Like this,” he whispered.  She felt stiff under his touch, but he slowly started to rock her shoulders and eventually she relaxed and let him lead her.  After a few seconds, her confidence resurged and she tried to add in some hip movement as well.  His smile encouraged her and he released her shoulders and put his hands on her hips and again guided her movements.  The pressure of his palms against her made her feel flush so she secretly thanked the light bulb for flickering, and hopefully, hiding her redness.  The song was building to its final part and she felt as though she was getting the hang of the rhythm.  She looked up from her waist to find him looking at her.  When their eyes met, he nodded reassuringly and she smiled widely and let a hand rest upon his shoulder.

Abruptly, the flickering light stopped.   She and Kaidan were left standing in the darkness as the final notes of the song played out before the omnitool winked out. Without the music, she could hear his breath and realized just how close they were standing.  His finger twitched on her hip, but he did not withdraw his hand. Her hand was paralyzed on his shoulder and as time inched forward, she realized she could distinctly feel his pulse throbbing.  The thumping of his heart matched her own as they stood together in the pitch blackness of the quiet apartment.  

Kaidan’s breath came upon her cheek so she turned her face towards his.  His face inched closer to hers until the familiar bristle of his beard urged her forward and she pressed her lips against his.  She found them parted ever so slightly as her tongue grazed his lower lip.  He yielded to her as she gingerly traced the rim of his mouth.  He pulled her hips towards him until they were pressed against him and she could feel his heat all along her body.  She let her hand slide down his shoulder and back as she sunk more deeply into him.  His tongue came to meet hers and tickled it tenderly.  Growing eager to feel his lips again, she pulled her tongue back and his lips rush to meet hers.  She inhaled deeply and drank in his warmth before pulling away.  

She ran her hand along his shoulder and arm as she withdrew, feeling his pulse drum all along the way.  His hand slowly fell away from her hips and she took a step backwards to try and catch her breath.  They remained there for a moment in the darkness while she listened to his breathing steady.  Then she heard his feet shuffle across the carpet and the click of the latch opening.

“Goodnight, Kaidan.”  His name caught in her throat and she wasn’t sure he heard her until a quiet, “Goodnight, Shepard,” crept over the room.

***

She had tried to sleep.  She really had, but Shepard should have realized by now that sleep was not her friend.  After their kiss, she willed her pulse to slow, her heart to return to a normal rhythm, but they would not comply.  So after an hour of tossing and turning on ol’ Green Dusty, she clicked the lantern on and padded quietly to the kitchen table again.

The criminal always returns to the scene of the crime,  she thought wryly.  Seating herself back in front of the coffee maker, she clicked the lantern back off to allow the shadows to infiltrate her thoughts.  

Her mind flitted about a swirling list of anxieties.   _Is James okay?  He’s not back yet.  Could he contact us if he needed help?  Why didn’t I go with him?  Damn arm.  Is it ever going to really heal?  When will I use my shotgun again?  It probably needs a good cleaning.  Haven’t touched it since the bus station.  Should I look at the stitches again?  If I unwrap it, will I be able to resist hurting myself again?  Kaidan might come out here and catch me.  How will I explain it?  How can I explain what happened tonight?  Did I push him too far too fast?  It was just a kiss.  What does a kiss mean anyway?  But those lips...  With this war going on, we can’t really get back together.  Can we?  Does he even want to?  It was just an impulse.  Heat of the moment.  I should just pretend like nothing is different.  When James gets back, he’ll come out to see how the mission went.  Pretend I was asleep.  That is if James gets back.  I hope he’s okay._

She pressed her forehead against the cool surface of the table to try to find a rock to cling to before her thoughts swept her further away.  Closing her eyes as tightly as she could, she listened inward for the voice of Samara, the Asari Justicar who had taught her that clearing the mind was indeed possible even after a typhoon.  

“Breathe.  Be here.  Be now,” she whispered to herself as she let the coolness spread over her cheek.  

It was starting to work when she heard a low humming that reminded her of the ambient noise of her quarters on the Normandy.  They were louder when her quarters were on the crew deck and she could hear the bustle of the crew right outside her door.  How many nights had she lain awake wondering if that was Kaidan pulling a late shift just feet from her room?  Her mouth pulled into a small smile against the metal table as she recalled her favorite daydream from that era.  She would be on her bed examining datapads and intel reports in the wee hours of the morning, half dressed from an abandoned attempt to get some food from the mess hall when her door would slide open unexpectedly.  Kaidan would stroll in with a report or something for her and be instantly mortified that he’d intruded so boldly.  He would turn to leave, but she’d somehow catch him, tell him he didn’t have to leave, let him drink in her nearly naked form then slide his shirt off…

What was that humming noise?  It was starting to get annoying now, so she cracked open an eye to find and break the source of the noise that so rudely interrupted her delightful distraction.  Bolting upright, she realized the power was on again.  Not flickering, but actually steadily on and her instincts took over.  In one gesture, the First Human Spectre Commemorative Mug was under the brew spout and the start button was depressed.

The rumble of the water heating pulled her in closer so that her nose was almost touching the white plastic.  A tense minute passed while her fingers curled tightly around the edge of the table and when the noise stopped, she inhaled sharply and held her breath.  

A tiny squeal released the air within the tube and the first few precious drops of hot water plopped onto the awaiting grounds.  Unable to contain her enthusiasm, Shepard pushed back the chair and leapt to her feet.  After one quick air fist pump, she reminded herself to pull it back together lest she curse the final minute it needed to brew her one cup of black gold.  She forced her butt back into the chair and gnawed on her bottom lip until she tasted blood. 

Thirty seconds later, the power popped prematurely and she let herself slump to the linoleum floor.  Her knees instinctively curled up to her chest, and she was going to allow herself a defeated cry, but she heard the drip continue.  Peering up over the lip of the table as though witnessing the brewing would somehow summon cruel and vengeful coffee gods to stop the water in its tracks, she saw the last few drops make their way into the cup.  Rising slowly, she clicked on the lantern and peered into the mug to find it three-quarters full.

Coffee happened.

With trembling fingers she reached for the handle and brought it to her face.  Inhaling euphorically, she did one more slow motion air fist pump in celebration.

She paused to revel in the moment when the second Spectre mug caught her eye.  It was yearning to be filled, so she carefully poured half of her precious coffee into it.  A moment later, she found herself at Kaidan’s door with two mugs in one hand and the lantern in the other.

She didn’t bother to knock, but tucked the lantern carefully under her arm and turned the knob.

Slipping inside, she realized she had never been in James and Kaidan’s room.  There were two twin beds on either side of the room.  One side had personal items strewn about and one was meticulously organized into piles and drawers.  As the light spread over the beds, Kaidan grumbled and rolled over.  Making her way closer, she dropped the lantern on the end of the second bed where it could still light her path through what she suspected was James’ debris.  Stepping carefully over a pile of suspicious looking underwear, she became aware of Kaidan’s eyes upon her.  

“Shepard, what the…” he began, but she shushed him into waiting while she maneuvered the remaining short distance and passed one hot cup to him.  It took him a moment to reach out for it, but as soon as he did, she unceremoniously plopped onto the bed next to him. 

Instinctively or with resignation, he made some space for her by inching closer to the wall and pulling back the blankets to reveal the quirky kid’s space-themed sheet set he’d proudly procured days earlier.  

Without hesitation, she kicked up her feet and tucked herself into Kaidan’s bed.  In the back of her mind, she couldn’t believe her own brazenness allowed her to behave in such a way, but the intoxicating victory of hot coffee compelled her to share.

She clinked her mug against his before finally putting it to her lips.  The steam tickled the inside of her nose as she inhaled deeply and drank with her eyes closed to savor the moment.  

It was just like she remembered.

Shepard let the coffee steep in her mouth trying to memorize this exact feeling.  She let out a satisfying sigh and opened her eyes.  Kaidan was giving her a bemused smile.  It must have been quite the sight; the famous Commander Shepard with crazy bedhead having a mouthgasm in between his space sheets.  

“Well?”  She nodded to his cup.  “Try it.”  She wrapped an arm around him in camaraderie, and thankfully he slid an arm behind her back in return.  Her eyes bulged as he brought the cup to his lips and drank.  He released a low groan of appreciation and she let a tiny squeal slip before she was able to tuck it in.

“This is great, Shepard.”  He smiled at her genuinely and they leaned together amicably while they sipped.  So engrossed were they in their coffee break, she didn’t hear the click of the front door or the heavy footfalls of their roommate entering.

“What the hell is going on here?” James asked.  He was leaning against the bedroom door frame with his arms crossed over his chest and a wry grin on his face.   His shoulder armor had some scuffs, and a few splotches of blood were drying on his chest plate, but Shepard was happy to see that he didn’t seem much worse for wear after his solo mission that evening.  Kaidan must have also been surprised by James’ return as he jumped a little at the sound of his voice.  He pulled his arm back from Shepard’s lower back and his mouth fell open looking for an explanation as to why their leader was in his bed.  Before he could make words though, James held up a hand to stop him.  “Wait, is that coffee I smell?”  Kaidan gave a quick laugh mixed with a sigh and held out his cup to him.

James took it and eyed it suspiciously before taking a quick sip.  His eyebrows rose in surprise and he nodded.  Shepard and Kaidan both nodded back enthusiastically.  The air of whimsy quickly dispelled, however, and it became suddenly awkward with the three of them trying desperately to look at anything but each other.

Shepard unwound her arm from Kaidan’s shoulders and hoisted herself out of the bed.  Clearing her throat, she collected both empty mugs and made her way to the door.  She pretended not to notice James kick his unmentionables under the bed as she passed, but paused at the door and looked back over her shoulder.

“You know Kaidan, those  _are_  nice sheets.”  She heard James groan loudly before she swung the door closed behind her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have I mentioned recently that Nova is a beta goddess? She also fights reapers on the side.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What had meant to be a relaxing evening stargazing on the roof turns into a frantic fight to a landing zone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well this is it! The final chapter. I'm really pleased to complete such a big project. Thank you to everyone for their help, encouragement, and interest in this story. Whether loud or silent, I felt it. :)

There was an eerie calm on the roof of the apartment building.  Above the Reaper patrolled streets, Shepard could lean back and look skyward.  As a child on Mindoir, she would stargaze nearly every night and think about just how far away the rest of the galaxy seemed, and how mysterious and wonderful the worlds beyond must be.  Conjuring classic colony propaganda posters, she envisioned a wild frontier rife with new discoveries and adventure.  Back then, she didn’t believe she would ever step foot off the family farm, but the reality of just how harsh the universe could be smashed that illusion the day the Batarians arrived.  

She had come up to the roof this evening to try and capture a sliver of that old dream again, but rather than finding a sky full of stars, she found explosions of warfare erupting across the horizon.  She inhaled deeply in response and settled against her backrest who groaned lightly but pressed back reassuringly.  She and Kaidan sat back-to-back in the middle of the roof, their necks craned upward at what might be a beautiful light display if not for the knowledge that each tiny fireworkwas more human lives snuffed out by the Reapers.  It was hard to find even the illusion of peace these days.

The ball of despair she always kept tucked deep inside her gut started to pulse and flare as more explosions lit up the sky.  She tried to inhale slowly to ground herself in the here and now, but the edges of her vision started to blur and she could not pull her gaze from the innumerable lights winking out above.  

“Shepard.”  Kaidan’s voice sounded like a distant echo, but she let it reverberate in her ears until it came closer.  He pulled away from her, so she placed her hands in the gravel to steady herself.  The cool roughness helped to clear her vision and bring her consciousness back to the rooftop.

She cleared her throat.  “Yeah, Kaidan?”  When he didn’t respond, she looked over her shoulder towards him.  He had turned himself around to face her, one hand in the gravel, the other reached out for her shoulder.  She let it land and turned herself to face him.  Coming up onto his knees, he pulled her up by the elbows so that their bodies pressed together.  His scruffy cheek rested against hers and scratched her lightly.  She inhaled his scent and swallowed it down to sooth the pit pulsing in her abdomen.  

“Shepard,” he whispered into her ear and she felt her legs go limp beneath her.  He cupped her elbows tighter as she started to slump, holding her up.  He pulled back letting his stubble brush against her cheek.  

“Kaidan.”  His name felt good on her lips.  His hands moved from her elbows to her hips and pulled her in even closer so that she could feel his belt buckle pressing against her.  She closed her eyes and parted her lips in anticipation.

_Chirp_ .

She furrowed her brow.  It had been a while, but she was pretty sure Kaidan didn’t chirp.  Especially not when he was trying to get in some smooches.

_Chirp chirp._

His hands fell away from her hips and she opened her eyes to see him fussing with his omnitool.  Now that she saw it, she recognized the sound it made when he received a message.  For a split second, she felt a clench of anger that he would interrupt their tender moment with work, but then it dawned on her that he hadn’t received a message since the invasion began.  His hands stopped and lingered in the air and his gaze slowly rose and met hers. 

“It’s a message,” she said.

“From Anderson.”  She squinted at him as though it would make the news more clear.  They had been trying for weeks to get Alliance brass on their comms, so to suddenly receive a message out of nowhere seemed odd.  “The roof has better reception than the basement, I think,” Kaidan said.

“Play it,” she said.  He nodded and she heard him inhale deeply before starting the recording.

Shepard.  I’m sending you a nav point.  We are coming in for a pickup.  Things aren’t progressing well here on the Citadel and we need you.  The Council won’t give us support for Earth, but I did convince them to reinstate your Spectre status.  The Turian councilor has requested a meeting with you.  It’s our only lead.  The Normandy will be at the LZ at 0600.  

She couldn’t believe her ears.  Spectre?  Pick up?  The Normandy?  She looked up at Kaidan.  He looked resolute, like a soldier receiving an order that he was eager to fulfill.  Her heart thumped hard once against her chest.  Shepard raised her injured arm and flexed it purposefully, testing it for the strength she needed.  Although there was lingering numbness, her hand complied and blue biotic energy ebbed between her fingers.

“That’s in just three hours, Shepard,” Kaidan said.  She nodded, lowered her arm, and started to move past him to the stairwell.  

“Shepard, wait.”  His hand caught her as she tried to move past, and in one fluid movement, he swung her back around and pressed her in closely against his body once again.  She had been calculating their strategic approach to the Reaper-infested landing zone Anderson had sent them, so when she found herself less than an inch from Kaidan’s face, she was a bit startled.  Even more so when he kissed her urgently.

She melted into his embrace, weaving her fingers into his hair and pulling him deeper.  She parted her lips, giving him permission to have a luxurious moment of reprieve before returning to duty.  His tongue brushed hers ever so lightly before retreating as he pulled back.

“I’m sorry, Shepard, it’s just that--” he began but she silenced him with another slow kiss at the corner of his mouth.

“No need to explain, Kaidan.”  She knew the dangers.  Of war.  Of Reapers.  Of anything and everything trying to come between them again.  Of things preventing them from having the simple freedom to just be with each other for a quiet moment.  She understood it all in the way his voice quivered.  He wanted this kiss because each one could be their last and they had lost too many chances already.  But the war raged on above and around them, and it was time for them to get back to work, so she pressed her forehead against his for one stolen tender moment before pulling away.

“Pack your things, Major.  We leave in twenty.”

***

English Bay was thrumming with Reapers.  Their movements along the boardwalks and docks echoed over the water and reverberated in Shepard’s ears high above on a nearby balcony.  From this height, she could make out individual creatures, but more astonishing and daunting was their patterns of movement.  Like a colony of ants, the reapers moved with the precision and efficiency that only a hivemind could create.  Not a mass of singular creatures with a similar goal, but a swarm creating one massively powerful foe.  Perhaps if Garrus were here with his Widow…  But no, picking off individual targets to whittle down the group seemed unlikely as the entire swarm would notice even one link of the chain missing.  

Shepard sighed audibly and turned to her team waiting inside the high rise office building they’d borrowed for this reconnaissance.  “Anybody have any better options?”  They all shrugged or shook their heads.  

“The Normandy needs the length of the bay to make its approach,” Kaidan explained.

She nodded.  “We will have to fight our way through then.  Mr. Hernandez, can you set up some fireworks to draw them away from the docks?”  

“Been saving up,” he said and smiled wickedly.  

“Take the rest of the team with you and hunker down until we’re on board.  You should be able to make a smooth getaway while they are emptying their thermal clips on us,” Shepard ordered.  They all nodded slowly, silently understanding the implications of such a dangerous diversion mission.  “Wait.”  She held up one hand before they turned to leave.  “I’m not one for gentle words or inspirational speeches, and I won’t lie about our chances, but I just need to say that you’ve all been the best damn team I could hope for.  The Resistance isn’t dead.  I’ll make sure of it.”  She shook each person’s hand vigorously and patted them heartily on the back before they made their way through the lines of overturned cubicles, shattered glass, and desk chairs to the door.  As the last one out, Siggurd made one quick glance back so she waved weakly, only just managing to stave off the tears until the office door clicked shut.

“Lola, they’ll do good,” James said, laying a comforting hand on her shoulder.  She placed a hand over his and gave it a small squeeze before wiping away the final tear from her cheek.  

Clearing her throat, she signaled that it was time to move.

***

From their tiny foxhole near the docks, Shepard waited for the explosion that would signal go-time.  Crouched down beside her, Kaidan and James breathed quietly.

“Time?” she mouthed silently to them.  Kaidan held up two fingers in response to indicate two minutes until Mr. Hernandez’ planned explosion.  She nodded and turned back to the tiny slit in the overturned cargo box that provided her only view of the activity outside.  This transport box had long been robbed of its contents and tossed aside, but they had been able to maneuver themselves inside undetected by exploiting the ebbing patterns they’d scouted out earlier.  The mechanized movements of the reapers had some weaknesses after all.  Through the opening, she analyzed the battlefield for cover and their escape route.  It could work--in theory.

Kaidan caught her attention and held up five fingers, beginning a countdown.  On two, an explosion shook the ground throwing them back and making their armor clank heavily against the metal of the cargo box.

“He wasn’t kidding when he said he saved up!” James said as he steadied himself and rubbed the back of his helmet where it had slammed against the walls.  Shepard realigned her eye to the slit and saw a similar scene outside.  Husks and marauders pulled themselves to their feet and dashed off towards the sound.  Shepard gave them a one minute head start, then kicked open the back latch.

Bolting out of their foxhole, they made their way to the first line of cover.  Most of the reaper forces were moving away from them thanks to the explosion, but a few stragglers remained on guard near the base of the dock they needed to use.  From her left, Kaidan surged with energy, and a biotic ball whipped past her and enveloped around one husk in a group of six.  She instantly recognized the Reave technique from when she worked with Samara, who had used it to save their hides at the Collector base.

“When did you learn to do that?” she asked with admiration.  

Kaidan smirked.  “I’ve been practicing.”  As the husk tried to shake off the effects, Shepard instinctively launched a biotic charge causing a massive explosion of energy that sent the remaining husks bowling off the dock and into the cold waters of the bay.

“Where did you learn that?” he asked with wide eyes.

“Asari Justicar,” she answered with a smirk that mirrored his own.  “I’ll tell you the story tonight over beers.”

“This I gotta hear,” James chimed in as he expertly popped off the swimming enemies that survived the explosion.

“It’s a date then,” she said then launched a shockwave down the length of the dock to clear their path to the next place for cover.  It smashed a few supply crates into splinters revealing a marauder who had been lying in ambush.  As it struggled to its feet, she lined up a headshot with her pistol and planted three quick hits.  The creature dropped its weapon and grabbed at its face feebly before Kaidan’s assault rifle finished the job and it dropped to the planks.  

Taking quick stock of their situation, Shepard realized that the dock was now clear for them to make it down to the landing zone coordinates that Anderson had sent them.  She signaled for them to move to the furthest spot that still afforded some protective cover and sprinted past the dead marauder.  Their heavy footfalls knocked loudly against the dock’s wooden slats, but a week of inactivity caught up to her as her breaths were ragged after only a short run and she ducked behind a metal shipping container, throwing her back against the wall.  James and Kaidan followed suit a dozen feet away.

She holstered her pistol and tested her wounded arm for strength.  Bringing it up close to her body, she cracked open her gauntlet to check for blood, but found the bandage clean, if a bit sweaty from the exertion of the battle.  Testing out her fingers slowly, she found they still complied, despite the numbness that was starting to creep up her wrist.  

“Shepard,” Kaidan called.  She looked across the dock to find him watching her intently.  “Are you good?” he asked when their eyes met.  She clicked her gauntlet back on and nodded, hearing him sigh with relief.

They could still hear fighting along the boardwalk, but as she was about to peer around the corner to see if the distraction team needed assistance, she heard the distant familiar hum of the Normandy’s engines.  She couldn’t give away their location now or the entire mission would be in jeopardy, so instead she turned her eyes to the horizon and her heart leapt at the beauty of the sun glinting off her ship as it approached.  Even amid all this turmoil, the pink and purple sunrise over the bay was stunningly beautiful.

In mere seconds, the ship was within range and the shuttle bay hatch swung open.   The Normandy had attracted some attention and the ground forces were firing upon her.  Leaning out from her barricade, Shepard laid down some cover fire so that James and Kaidan could make the six foot leap to the awaiting ramp.  As soon as their feet hit metal, Kaidan turned and beckoned to her, and she summoned the last of the oxygen in her lungs to run to the end of the dock.  James’ rifle shots continued to ring loudly over the Normandy’s engines as he made sure her path was clear.  With a final push, she leapt to Kaidan’s outstretched hand.  He clamped around her waist and pulled her inside.  After a few more shots, James hit the shuttle bay door control and it swung shut.  Kaidan helped her over to the nearest box and eased her down.

“We did it, Commander.”  His eyes wrinkled at the corners as he clapped her on the back.

“About damn time too,” Anderson called from the other end of the room.  She looked up as he crossed the floor to meet them.  

“Admiral, we were at the LZ at the exact time you sent us,” she managed to say between heavy breaths.

“That was for three days ago, Commander.  Your message must have been received late.  We figured you’d make it here eventually, so we came by again.”

Her eyes grew wide in disbelief.  Three days?  There went her perfect timing record.  She moved to begin an explanation, but he waved her off and instead dropped a small object into her hands.  Shepard looked down, but by the feel, she already knew that it was her Alliance dogtags.  Letting the last vestige of her bitterness at being relieved of duty melt away, she removed her helmet and slid them over her head.  They fell neatly against her chestplate.

“Joker, bring us to the drop zone,” Anderson announced.

“Right away, sir,” Joker answered over the intercom.

“Drop zone?” She looked at Anderson quizzically.

“I’m stepping off, Shepard.  I’m no good as a diplomat, and the people here need a leader.  I’ve already made contact with some other resistance groups.  We can’t win this, but I can help here while you get the Council support we need to have a fighting chance.”

The news hit her so hard that she was physically taken aback and Kaidan had to steady her so she didn’t slip off the box she was sitting on.  Anderson had succeeded where she had failed at organizing an effective resistance.  Now she would have to succeed where he had failed and make the Council listen.

She nodded to him gravely as the shuttle bay doors opened again. “I’ll be back for you.  I’ll bring every fleet I can.”  She paused as she found his eye then added, “good luck.”   

The Normandy lowered to the twisted metal of a commercial loading dock that had been mangled in the invasion.  Anderson drew his pistol and leapt down without another word, the hatch closing unceremoniously behind him.

“Commander, Admiral Hackett is on vidcom.” EDI’s voice rang through the shuttle bay.  “I believe he wishes us to stop at Mars before we go to the Citadel.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This project would not have been possible without the help of my brilliant and talented beta. Thank you for not giving up on me even after the 5 millionth comma shift. <3

**Author's Note:**

> Forever appreciation for Beta magic by Nova.


End file.
